What happened the last time RCB played a match at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai? 

Chennai Super Kings (CSK) host Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) in the first match of IPL 2024 at the MA Chidambaram Stadium on Friday, March 22. Promising to be a game filled with thrills, this is bound to go into the history books.

The two teams, who are giants in their own right, also form the 'southern derby' and are known to bring fans from far and wide either into stadiums or in front of their television sets.

It has to be noted that there have been 31 encounters between these two teams in the past, out of which CSK have won 20 games, while RCB have won 10. One game, on 24 April 2012 in Bengaluru, was deemed to be a no-result.

What is interesting about this game in Chennai on Friday is that these two teams are meeting here for the first time in five years. In a curious turn of events, Chennai has not hosted a CSK vs RCB game since March 23, 2019.

The 2020 IPL was played in the United Arab Emirates owing to the outbreak of COVID-19 in India, while the two teams did not meet in Chennai in the first half of the 2021 edition, which was played in India. The second half, of course, was played in UAE later in the year.

In fact, RCB did play in Chennai that year, although the last time they did was against Kolkata Knight Riders in the first phase of the tournament on April 18.

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RCB last played at Chepauk in 2021

The two Mos chatting with each other- Mo Bobat of RCB and Moeen Ali of CSK. [RCB]

Winning the toss and choosing to bat first, RCB posted a mammoth 204/4 in their allotted 20 overs in that game in 2021. Virat Kohli and Devdutt Padikkal opened the innings for Bengaluru, but the former fell in the second over to Varun Chakravarthy.

Padikkal continued to get to 25 but by then Rajat Patidar had joined him in the middle and departed after scoring just one. If not for Glenn Maxwell and AB de Villiers' brilliant partnership in the middle order, RCB would have struggled to get as many runs on the board.

Maxwell ended with 78 off 49 balls, while de Villiers remained unbeaten on 76 off a mere 34 deliveries. Both overseas stars hit three sixes each in their respective innings.

Apart from Chakravarthy, who picked up two wickets, Pat Cummins and Prasidh Krishna bagged a wicket apiece for Kolkata in this game.

Chasing a target of 205, KKR tried their best but fell short by 38 runs. Openers Nitish Rana and Shubman Gill tried to stitch together a partnership but were unsuccessful at doing so. Rahul Tripathi and skipper Eoin Morgan chipped in with 20s of their own, as did Shakib Al Hasan lower down the order, but it did not help them very much. Even Andre Russell's 20-ball 31 proved futile for the Knight Riders.

Kiwi seamer Kyle Jamieson was the star of the RCB bowlers, ending up with figures of 3/41, while Yuzvendra Chahal and Harshal Patel ended up with two wickets apiece. Washington Sundar too ended up with a solitary wicket.

Possessing happy memories from the last time they played at Chepauk, RCB will want to bank on them when they compete against CSK on Friday. They will also aim to pick up their first two points of the new season.